Monthly Archives: February 2010

whew! finally got my dance on last night at sweat!, a nyc based queer friendly party. dj’s were consistently good, and the congos we wailed on felt so good under my hands. my mom taught me to drum, but i don’t do it as much as i could, so waking up with hands sore from speaking in that resonant tongue is an infinite feeling. we danced to mass appeal, around the way girl, fela, and illmatic cuts. my shiva blue reeboks felt like they had talcum powder underneath them. you ever get to that point on the floor when you are actually wondering if flight is imminent? excuse me while i kiss the sky…

comedienne roopa singh (photo: piper anderson)

tonight i’m doing stand up at the bronx academy of arts and dance for an Equality Ride fundraiser. since 2006, this cross country tour has been making a difference for lgbt students at bible belt universities with high rates of gay student suicide, schools that routinely expel students for loving the wrong person. the equality riders are like the gay version of the freedom riders, but instead sitting in at lunch counters, the equality riders roll up on schools, whether they are welcome or not. bodies on the line, nuff respect to them. find out more: click on me to learn more about the equality ride.

surrogate love. when inside your soul, within the hours of your life, you are providing a partner like space for another. and that other responds to you like a partner. sometimes. when it’s just the two of you on the phone, its as though you never broke up. when it’s only y’all in the house, she treats you like her man. but neither of you are actually trying to do this. so you keep this relationship type thing surrounding you like a shield, a forcefield reminding you constantly that real love doesn’t exist. and meanwhile, that real love may be finding it hard to penetrate into your world. real love stymied. effective self-sabotage.

under the law a couple is only officially divorced when they are both physically and emotionally separated. that is, first you separate your stuff, split the property (if you’re in a community property state like cali or ny), and then you begin to cut away at the emotional ties. which is harder. way harder. in fact, the reason why people get so caught up in the division of property is because that’s their surrogate for all the emotional entanglement that feels unfathomable in terms of extraction. on the flip side, a lot of us stay entangled emotionally with folks without actually committing, surrendering to the deep sea dive of love.

surrogate love.

an informal poll amongst the homies tells me that surrogate love is alive and well. one dope brother has two women he can’t stop thinking about. both are gorgeous, talented, and totally unavailable, that is, they both are in relationships that they aren’t passionate about, but they also ain’t tryna leave. he feels like both they man. but in reality, he’s single, surrounded by dope women who are actually available. but he’s not open to these women. because that would mean entertaining the possibility that he may truly fall in love. with someone who may truly fall in love with him. surrender is a challenging state.

i have some experience with surrogate love. talking on the phone with my ex like every day. being there for each other in our times of real crises. but not really being there for each other in public. no commitment, except to a general idea of friendship, and to the covert continuation of our partnership in emotional ties and patterns of deep and confusing flirtation.

what am i scared of?

really shedding the emotional ties with a former partner feels like taking off the pads in a game of tackle football. except the game has changed. its flag football. and i’m out there wearing my helmet and pads. i’m on a bright green field, we got refs with stripes and whistles, the winter air is sun charged and crisp. and i’m not the only one who has suited up all wrong for the game. but i’m going to be one of the first to acknowledge it. and take off these pads. take off this helmet. i’ve got all the armor i need in my ability to be flexible and proven strength. i believe what is before my eyes. the game has changed.

are you a surrogate lover for someone else too frightened to let go? do you use someone else as a surrogate love, surrounding yourself with a shield to “protect” you from what may be true, about love and surrender? holler at me. let’s talk.

i gave this talk on sex and love last night at pace university. and the students there had startlingly relevant questions and answers on the topic. how do you know if you’re cheating (answer: if you’re even asking, you’re probably toeing a slim line)? how do you know when it’s time to move on (answer: take your time deciding, but do move on because theirs more on the other side)

temple facade in india: photo by mbs

but most pressing was the idea of separating emotions from sex. folks wondered if they should use casual sex as a way of getting over an ex. someone else asked why sex feels so much more now that they’ve come out as gay. and i have to wonder. how hard do we work to separate the heart from the body before, during, and after casual sex? and isn’t just as much work to figure out how to stay connected, instead?

look, im not knocking casual sex. but i do think that love and sex are historically connected for a reason. because they enhance each other. complement each other. make each other more juicy, more whole.

here goes some love poems, inspired by a chance encounter with casual sex, based on a true story: